St. Louis Cardinals

The A’s would like to add a starting pitcher before the trade deadline comes around Wednesday, and the A’s have a preference for that pitcher to be Jake Peavy.

Wishing doesn’t make it so, of course, but the club is very much in the hunt for the Chicago White Sox’s right-hander, who cleaned out his locker Sunday morning with all indications a trade is just a day or so, if not an hour or so, away.

The Braves, the Dodgers, the Cardinals and the Red Sox came into Sunday as fellow contenders in the race to get Peavy as the White Sox try to shed salary and add good young prospects.

If you want to break down the difference between winning and losing for the A’s and the Cardinals Sunday at the Coliseum, you have to look to the seventh inning.

You have to look at the run the Cardinals did not get and the run that the A’s did score.

After six innings, the A’s had a 6-5 lead and had dipped into the bullpen for lefty Sean Doolittle. The Cardinals got a leadoff double from Matt Carpenter, who looped a ball down the left field line in wide-open turf and suddenly the Cardinals’ high-powered offense was primed with the National League’s leading hitter, Yadier Molina, at the plate.

Matt Holliday was supposed to change the way things were done in Oakland.

An outfielder with a big bat, big RBI potential and a big salary, Holliday was the A’s foray into big-money baseball.

That lasted for less than a full season. Oakland general manager Billy Beane acquired Holliday for a hefty price – letting a proven reliever, Huston Street, and a would-be star, outfielder Carlos Gonzalez, go to Colorado.